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My mum doesn’t understand my anxiety

I’m 18 and today my mum was helping me look for jobs. Then she said I needed to call this place to find out for information I didn’t want to as calls are one of the things that set of my anxiety the most. So I called them and as soon as they answered I could feel an anxiety attack coming on so I ended it straight away and my mum gave me a death stare for 5 minutes and didn’t say anything then she started yelling at me and saying she is going to kick me out. She says I don’t have anxiety and it’s just shyness as she works with people with mental health problems and supports them she said that people with anxiety can barely do anything for themselves and that’s not me so I don’t have anxiety I’m just convincing myself I have it. What do I do?

Reply 1

Anonymous #2

I'm so sorry you're going through this. Sometimes parents don't want to accept that their children are struggling with their mental health because they feel as though they've done something wrong. I'm sure your mum just wants the best for you. Maybe her personal experiences with people with anxiety has made her scared that you won't be able to succeed as much as she would like you to if you do have anxiety.

Maybe talk to her about it. Explain that your anxiety isn't as severe as the people she knows and that just because you can do stuff, it doesn't mean that you don't have it. Tell her that yelling at you and threatening you isn't going to help. Try to talk to someone too. If you don't already go to therapy maybe ask her if you can (if that's something that you think would help you).

Also, I get really anxious when I have to answer phone calls too and something that has helped me a lot is practicing with my friends. I have a friend that doesn't like texting so I've been forced to phone call them whenever we wanna talk. At first I'd get so scared- sweaty hands, increased heart rate and all- but then it got easier over time and now calling them is no biggie. That's helped me a lot with other phone calls.

I hope everything gets better. :smile: